


Heaven Couldn't Wait

by Mardiaz173



Series: Go On, Go Home [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ageswap, Angst, Big Brother Sam, Grief, Little Brother Dean, M/M, Older Sam, Protective Sam Winchester, Revenge, Sam POV, Younger Dean
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-08-13
Packaged: 2018-07-19 17:59:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7371919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mardiaz173/pseuds/Mardiaz173
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean's dead. It's the worse call Sam has ever gotten in his entire life, and it's why Sam left Stanford and went off to Sioux Falls, South Dakota to find out what happened to his baby brother. Turns out, it's a lot more complicated than Sam originally thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Denial

The trip to South Dakota is tiresome, long, and quiet. Sam's been operating on autopilot since he found out what happened to Dean. He had scared the hell out of Jess, and Sam almost feels guilty for it. 

Almost, his baby brother is dead. He doesn't know how he's going to go on. 

Jess had asked him if he was returning and he hadn't had the heart to tell her why he didn't think he was going to. Odds are she knew anyway. When he finds out what happened to Dean and goes after that son of a bitch who took him, Sam's not going to be overly cautious with his own safety. 

What's the point?

His baby brother is dead.

Oh God, oh God, oh God. 

Sam swerves the car to the curb just before he breaks down, breath too fast for him to control and body quaking spasmodically. 

He can't believe that he didn't try harder for Dean to come live with him. Why didn't he push harder to talk with Dean? How could he let this happen? Why didn't Dad tell Sam Dean was missing? He had to have known that if Sam had gotten that phone call he would've dropped everything to find his Dean. 

Sam lets out a rasping breath and tries to get control of himself. He has to stay focused. He can't let himself fall apart just yet. He has to find out what happened. He has to rip the heart out the thing that had hurt his baby brother. He needs to see the thing die painful and bloody for taking Dean from Sam. He needs to. 

Reaching a sort of mental composure, Sam sets the car on the road again as he makes his trek to Sioux Falls with a renewed sense of determination. 

He'll mourn his brother after, okay? He'll mourn Dean after Sam's ripped the head off of Dean's killer. He'll find his brother and hold him and grovel and put him to rest just like he deserves. 

But he has a mission right now. And he's not going to stop until he's finished with it. 

***  
To be honest, Sam isn't sure whether or not Bobby knows what happened to Dean. Sure, he had been close to the man when he was little, but it's was almost a year since Sam saw Bobby before college and now, four years later, he doesn't even know if John kept in touch. 

Sam's doubtful; John doesn't like to keep in touch. Even if it's an emergency. 

Sam knows, though, that besides Pastor Jim and Caleb, Bobby would probably know where his father is and even if Bobby doesn't, he does deserve to know about Dean. 

Sam parks his car in the front of the house, noting a black truck placed in the driveway. Sam's 70% certain that the car is his dad's, and he's not happy about it, but that means that he doesn't have to search all over for his father. He can grill him right here. And, honestly, Sam's uncertain that this confrontation won't end in a fist fight. His blood is just boiling with rage at the fact that his father didn't tell Sam Dean was missing. 

Setting his teeth together, Sam trudges up to Bobby's house, trying to keep himself calm. He knocks on the door and it swings open to reveal Bobby, same dirt-old baseball cap and beer gut, rocking hair that just skims the back of his neck. 

"Sam," he rasps out, eyes red and tired. He reaches out to engulf Sam in a hug and Sam's more than ashamed to admit that it takes quite a bit of effort on his part to return the hug. 

"Hey, Bobby," he replies. 

Bobby lets him go and claps him on the shoulder. "Wish I could say it's good to see you."

"You, too, Bobby." 

Bobby glances back behind him. "Your daddy's here as well." 

As if on cue, Sam's father appears in the doorway behind Bobby, looking both tired and miserable. He glances down and up again, almost as if he's sizing Sam up. Sam knows he has bulked up from a bit when he left and he let his hair grow out. John doesn't seem all that different. He has got a few more grays in his hair and his beard is leaning more silver than dark brown nowadays, but his face is still etched in a frown and he's still the same size. 

"Sam," he says, face twisting like saying Sam's name physically pains him. "It's been a long time, son." 

Sam nods. 

"The last time we saw each other, we had one helluva fight," John continues. "Don't think it's the time to rehash that just yet."

"No, sir," Sam responds, clenching his jaw. He wants to tear into his father for things that don't even have to do with their last fight, but he can wait until after he hears what happened. He needs to know what happened. 

John's eyes rake over him once more and his eyes fill with what Sam thinks is guilt before they turn cold. "There's whisky in the living room," he says softly before turning and walking towards said room. Sam follows him. 

He doesn't bother settling himself into a chair or even getting a glass. He's not giving them any illusions that he's here to mourn with them. He's not here to bury away his sorrows. Sam's on a one track mission and John better get used to it. 

"What happened?" he asks, arms crossed, as John sits down and watching Bobby make his way up the stairs like he knows what's coming while John downs his glass of whisky. "To Dean," Sam clarifies, as if there needs to be any clarification, as if John doesn't know what he's talking about. "What happened?" 

"It was a hunt down in Vegas. Werewolves," John replies and his lips quirk up a bit. "Your brother loved Vegas." 

A pulse of _angersorrowguilt _flares through Sam at the thought of his brother before what John says sinks in.__

__"He was on a hunt? By himself?" Sam asks, uncrossing his arms and stepping towards John, horror etched in his voice. "You let him on a hunt?"_ _

__"Sam, you knew this," John sighs._ _

__"I knew he was by himself! I thought you left him in some motel while you were on your own hunt! I didn't know that he was in Vegas by himself while you were off in fuckin' New York two days over! He's a kid!"_ _

__"Your brother is gonna be nineteen in a couple of months, Sam," John says absentmindedly before he twists his mouth into an unpleasant line. "He was gonna—"_ _

__Sam sucks in a breath; his brother, his baby brother, didn't even make it to nineteen. Didn't even make it to drinking age. Didn't even make it a full two decades. He died alone and their father didn't even think to tell Sam, who was a helluva lot closer to Dean in Palo Alto than their father was in New fuckin' York City._ _

__"Why didn't you tell me? He was missing and did you not even think to tell me? You couldn't have, because I would've found him. I was eight hours away, you were thirty-six! And you didn't even tell me! How long was he missing?"_ _

__"It was two days after he was supposed to call that I started making the drive back," John responds quietly._ _

__Sam's vision flares red. "Two days? You waited two days? That entire drive is two days, Dad! I was eight hours!"_ _

__"You made it pretty clear that you didn't want anything to do with us, Sam," John says, standing and stepping closer to Sam. "You left."_ _

__"Don't you dare! I was just going to college, like every other goddamn kid in America."_ _

__"No phone calls. No nothing, huh?"_ _

__"You're the one who told me if I left to stay gone! You're the one who cut me off!"_ _

__"You tried callin’ your brother. For years, you kept callin’ him, but he didn't wanna answer you."_ _

__Sam makes a noise akin to a growl, making motion even closer to John._ _

__"You had a job to your family, Sam. You had a job to us. You abandoned your family. We needed you and you left us in cold dust. You were supposed to take care of your brother and you left him!"_ _

__Sam is shaking with the amount of suppressed rage he's holding in. How dare he? How dare John blame Sam for what happened? His right hand is twitching just thinking about it._ _

__"You were supposed to take care of your son!" he shrieks, grabbing John's collar. "You were supposed to look after your son because he's your goddamn son! You should've protected him! You should've watched him! You weren't supposed to send him across the damn country tackling fuckin' werewolves by himself!"_ _

__"Don't tell me how to parent my son," John snarls._ _

__"What son? He's dead!" Sam cries. "He went missing and now he's dead! He's gone! Neither of us were there for him when he needed it and now we gotta deal with the result!"_ _

__It's quiet, real quiet, before John pushes away from him and grabs the rest of the whisky, making his way up the stairs and he doesn't speak another word to Sam, preferring to cast him a distasteful look when he reaches the top of the stairs and then continuing his trek._ _

__Ignoring his father, Sam turns around and clutches his hands to his face. This entire conversation was what he didn't want. He didn't need this, this panic to course through him._ _

__His brother, his baby brother. He's gone and Sam can't._ _

__Sam tries to regain control of his breathing and his eyes rove around the library wildly. He needs to do something. He can't—not with this. He can't just sit here and wallow. He's on a mission. He can't accept Dean's death. He has to fix it, he has to set this right and he needs to kill whatever killed Dean. He can't drink away his problems like his father, that's a last resort._ _

__He has to do something or else he's going to tear off his own skin and gouge out his eyeballs in his hysteria._ _

__He looks around. Bobby must have a thousand books on the supernatural and his library is proof of just that. Sam stares at one on the top of an old shelf, the book's dark, bulky spine reads Death, What It Really Means and Sam grabs it before setting himself down on a worn out, leather chair in the corner of the room._ _

__The book is about five hundred pages full of needless science mixed with philosophy. It explains what happens to the brain when someone dies (after death, the brain goes through an enormous spike in brain waves shortly before it falling dead) and how your spirit might possibly survive (one theory even presents it getting absorbed into nearby plants to help preserve the essence)._ _

__It's useless, nothing that could even remotely help Sam in his quest. He moves towards another one, it's small and blue, its cover spelled out in Greek. It's basic mythology, really, nothing that Sam already didn't know (Charon needing a golden drachma to get one across the River Styx, Cerberus, Persephone's rule of the Underworld and how it mostly likely exceeded her husband's.) There's a couple of papers hidden in the back of the book written in Egyptian hieroglyphics and talking about the scale of guilt and how Osiris determines who goes where based upon its ratio to a feather. A professor tries to even make the point on how it has nothing to do with what has been done, but how much the person felt guilty for what they had done._ _

__It's not helpful either, and so Sam grabs another book, full of stories this time. Four of them involve the personification of animals to help convey their meaning; one is about how the predator can become the prey, another is the difference between ambition and greed, the third about the real use of eyes, and the last about how perspective is everything. A fifth, written entirely in first person, is about a man whose wife suffered a heart attack and, in an attempt to save her, he replaces her heart over and over until his wife isn't his wife anymore and has no more emotion for her husband. The final story is about another person whose spouse is dying (a woman this time) and she uses a trinkets found in ancient boxes to summon a fairy to help save him, but it turns out that the woman's dying husband is a warlock pretending to be the fairy and he ends up decapitating his own wife._ _

__Sighing, Sam gets up once again to find yet another book. It's a spellbook for summoning a demon, but the last few pages are ripped out and the beginning is full of precautionary measures before you summon the demon and what you can do once you do summon one. It could help, help a lot if only Sam could find the remaining pages of the book._ _

__Resisting the urge to pull on his hair, Sam combs through four more books in Bobby's library. It's tedious work and Sam himself is vaguely aware of how the light in the room changes and sounds coming from the kitchen for about a half of one book and then stopping. In the back of his mind, Sam can wonder what it must seem like, for him to barge into Bobby's house like he owns the damn thing and start searching through his entire library. It makes him curious before his anger flares up once again, thinking about Bobby and John not doing a damn thing to save Dean because they can still save him, Sam knows it. And all Bobby and John are doing is placing cups of water and coffee at Sam's elbow about every book he finishes._ _

__Sam's reaching for another book when he feels a hand on his shoulder and he turns around to see Bobby staring at him worriedly. "Sam," he says, "you've been going through these books all night and day. You haven't eaten, you haven't slept. Why don'tcha take a nap and let me make you some food, okay? I know you're just tryna find a way to help your brother, but this ain't gonna help if you drop down dead cause you couldn't take care of yourself."_ _

__Opening his mouth, Sam's about to decline, to protest that he'll stay awake and fresh on his own damn will if it comes to that, but his body just won't agree with the sentiment. It pisses him off, that he can't even control himself to stay awake when his brother needs him. That he has a job to do and his fuckin' body is being a prissy little bitch and needs something as useless as sleep when he needs to find a way to bring his brother back. That's what's going on, though, so Sam makes a nod at Bobby, who tries to smile reassuringly._ _

__"C'mon, Sam, I gotta mattress for you upstairs. Your daddy's been using it, but I don't think he'll mind right now. "_ _

__A childish part of Sam wants to decline just because John slept in it, but he gets over it real quick. That'd be petty, and the exact opposite of what's needed right now. So instead of saying no, Sam nods, trudging himself up the stairs. There's a spare room, one not housing the guest bed or Bobby's and when Sam plops himself down on the mattress in it, he tells himself for just a few hours, then he can go back to looking for whatever he needs to help Dean._ _

__He doesn't know how he wakes up and there's light out. Sam told himself just a few hours, but this had to have been half a day at least. Growling to himself, Sam makes his way out of the spare room, running a hand through his hair, greasy and unkempt. Sam's down the steps and on a leather chair in the living room with a book in hand once again, unsure of how it came about. He's halfway through the book (on spells this time, and there's one for murder and one for love but Sam can't find a damn one for a human resurrection; the closest he got was a stupid zombie one and Sam would rather cut his own throat before he brought back his brother as a mindless zombie and Sam's ashamed to say he contemplated the zombie thing before the book said that he wouldn't be Dean) when John comes over, holding out a glass of whisky._ _

__Sam takes it and drinks it more out of the fact that he knows it is a sort of peace offering than out of the fact that he desires one, even if the burn that he feels in the back of his throat is welcoming, helping to numb the pain that Sam is feeling._ _

__John opens his mouth, but Sam cuts him off. "Dean," Sam says, voice low, "do you have him? You said you found him. Did you burn his body?"_ _

__"No," John replies terse. "He's upstairs. That's why I've been sleeping on that mattress. He's on the guest bed."_ _

__Sam shakes. He slept in the right room next door and he didn't even know. Didn't even know that his brother was in the room next to him. He didn't even think of it._ _

__He ignores that for now though, shoving it down deep as he stands. "Why didn't you—? It's been almost two weeks."_ _

__"We don't know what happened to him before he died, but his body won't decompose. It's still in the same shape it was when we found him."_ _

__Sam continues to quake. "I want—I want—"_ _

__"To see him," John finishes. "That's why we kept him."_ _

__Sam looks at his father in confusion._ _

__"There wasn't a body for me with your mother," John says simply._ _

__Sam knows that John probably doesn't mean it like how Sam takes it, he's probably trying to be as sympathetic as his father can be, but the comparison is more than applicable to the situation. He adored his brother like nothing else and now he's upstairs, and Sam tries to convey a grateful look at his father._ _

__If nothing else, at least he can see his brother one last time._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "There's nothing I wouldn't do for you. And I don't care what it takes, I'm gonna get you out of this."
> 
> -Sam Winchester 2x22 "All Hell Breaks Loose: Part Two"


	2. Bargaining

It doesn't take much of Sam's energy to will himself away from his father. The promise of, at least, seeing his brother is not diminished by the fact that he is going to see his brother dead. 

Sam thought he would have to search high and low for his father to, at least, know where his brother was. And then he had the thought that even if he found his father, John probably already burnt Dean's body before Sam could see him. He'd have to say his piece in front of his brother's pile of ashes. This is much better. 

Sam doesn't say a word to John. He makes a nod at him and then makes his way up the stairs towards Bobby's guest room. Sure, Sam suspects all the composure he's been trying to maintain will break in the face of his brother's corpse, in seeing what happened to his baby brother, but he can't bring himself to turn around. 

The door to the guest room is closed, maybe that's why Sam didn't notice what he slept next to, and Sam hesitates before opening it. He wants to prepare himself, he knows what he's going to see, but he's not delusional enough to think that what happened to his brother won't break him. It is entirely useless, what Sam is trying to do, yet he doesn't try to stop himself. 

The door creaks when Sam pushes it open and he can see his little brother laying on top of the bed, eyes closed and hands rested at his sides. He could almost be sleeping and a choked sob rises through Sam before he could even think about stopping it. 

He can't control himself as he almost stumbles down to the side of Dean's bed, collapsing on his knees and his palms gripping the sides of the bed with a desperate hold. 

He stares at his brother. His smooth lips slack, eyelashes (ridiculously long) delicate, blond hair puffed up and freckles dancing softly along the bridge of his nose. Dean's dressed in a nice, clean green shirt and jeans, but it does nothing to hide the cuts (slashed, like a fuckin' wolf) marring his throat and the twisted angle of his arm. 

It's _wrongwrongwrongwrongwrong _. Dean shouldn't be hurt like this, shouldn't have these extensive injuries, shouldn't be laying here quiet and still and cold and not right.__

__Sam can't breathe with the horror and disbelief tearing its way through his body. He raises his brother's clothes desperately, trying to note every single injury that Dean had sustained like a mental catalogue will somehow help him. Almost as if Sam can fix all the problems as long as he knows what the problems are._ _

__There's a couple of more slashes across Dean's chest, but there's also a bullet wound right where Dean's heart used to beat. It's almost as if Dean was executed, like he was one of the things they hunted, a monster. And even the slightest implication of Dean's gun being used against him amplifies Sam's anger exponentially._ _

__It's his job to take care of his brother. Sam and John didn't see eye-to-eye on a lot of things, but Sam can admit to himself that this is one area that they both could agree on. Dean was Sam's duty, Sam's baby brother, Sam's to look after and care for._ _

__Dean was Sam's._ _

__And if that's how he treats things that are his, Sam won't be able to live with himself. He tried to tell himself that he didn't do anything wrong, that whatever he did was justified, it was ridiculous to make Sam out to be the bad guy and he tried to convince John as well, but away from John's ears and accusations, looking at his baby brother's corpse laying out in Bobby's guest room, Sam can admit to himself, can shove away all of the denial that this isn't his fault._ _

__It is his fault._ _

__He had a job to do, and he left because he thought that would be the best way to perform it._ _

__Sam had honestly thought he was doing the right thing. That if he left he could somehow save Dean from his older brother's fucked up thoughts. That whatever was wrong with Sam wouldn't harm Dean because they wouldn't have been near each other, but after Sam had a couple of days just going over Dean's betrayed expression when he had left and Sam had tried to deal with the gaping hole in his chest, Sam hadn't been able to just let the no contact thing hold. He hadn't been the man he thought he was, but the damage had already been done and Dean hadn't answered the phone._ _

__Sam had thought that feeling would be the worst thing he ever experienced, the knowledge that his brother didn't want to speak with him. And even the fact that every year since, when Sam left messages to him on his birthday, that Dean still wouldn't respond, it was murder._ _

__But this, this is worst because back then, he had the slightest glimmer of hope that he could somehow get through to his brother, make him let go of the fact that Sam had left him. Somehow Sam could rectify the situation and get his brother back. This—this doesn't have that sort of glimmering of hope._ _

__And this isn't because Sam was trying to protect Dean. He can't speak to Dean now because of something Sam had been trying to do to protect him. No. He can't speak to Dean because his brother is now dead. Sam has no way to talk to his brother because he died while hunting monsters in Vegas by himself. His brother was too fuckin' young to be doing this, and now look what happened to him._ _

__Dean didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve to have his life ripped away from him before he even had the chance to really start it for himself._ _

__Sam needs a way to fix this and he can't think of a single idea._ _

__Wiping away the tears on his face, Sam steadies his breathing. If he wants a way to fix this, he's going to need way more information than just werewolves in Vegas. And he's going to need to find out why, almost two weeks later, his brother's body is the same way as it was when he died._ _

__And so, brushing his lips down on his brother's forehead quickly, Sam stands on shaky legs. "I'm going to fix this, Dean. I swear."_ _

__He wonders if the monster that killed his brother is dead._ _

__He hopes not._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "You wanna know what I confessed in there? What my greatest sin was? It was how many times I let you down. I can't do that again." 
> 
> -Sam Winchester 8x23 "Sacrifice"


	3. Anger

Sam wonders if it's shameful that he didn't tell Bobby or John that he was leaving before making his way to Vegas. He would care more, if he didn't have good reason for it.

And honestly, John could most understand revenge out of anyone and the lengths one would go for it. And that's why Sam didn't feel the least bit guilty about stealing Dean's notes from John before he left. It doesn't even matter, because for all Sam speaks fluent Dean, there isn't much to get out if those notes either. They're pretty straightforward. 

All they say are: 

**VEGAS ******  
**SMALL WEREWOLF PACK ******  
**MOTHERS & DAUGHTERS (2?) ******  
**RESPONSIBLE FOR 13 DEATHS ******  
**TOO MANY **  
****

It isn't so hard to figure out the meaning behind the notes.

Sam figures it's downtown Vegas he's going for; John always had rules about working cases in that city. He's always said that there's too many cameras so they should stay off the Strip.

Dean wouldn't have disobeyed them, not only because he was the 'good son,' but also because his brother hadn't been stupid. But it doesn't make Sam feel better, because downtown Las Vegas isn't the best place to be.

Even if you're trying to catch a small pack of werewolves. 

***  
Sam pulls into a Motel 6 in Vegas about a day and a half later. His limbs are heavy and throbbing, and he suspects it's because he didn't take any stops that weren't for tasteless food or to refill his gas tank.

He also suspects that this is the motel Dean had stayed at. His brother had always found the name 'Motel 6' funny. It had made sense from Dean's point of view, sure, but Sam didn't think anyone else would get it. 

Sam's grateful now, though. It makes it easier for Sam to track down Dean's pattern. Sam can retrace Dean's steps exactly, starting with the beginning. 

Sam's unnecessarily hyper vigilant when he walks into the motel, taking note of every single thing. He notes a couple arguing by the elevator, the manager talking animatedly with a younger man, the receptionist looking bored and annoyed at the front desk, and the familiar smell of smoke that floats throughout the lobby. 

Walking up to the front desk, Sam would try to school his features into a smile, but he doesn't want to manage the effort. So instead, Sam just lays an arm on desk and makes his height do the talking. 

"Room for one," he says to the girl. 

She nods and makes move towards the room keys and paperwork.

Sam fills it out absentmindedly, saying, "There was a guest that died a couple of weeks ago, right?" 

"Yeah," she replies, "but it wasn't anything that was our fault. And, the police already took his body. They're the one who had found him, anyway, in his room." 

Sam raises his eyebrows, feigning enlightenment. 

"And he was some, like, cop-in-training or something," the girl continues. "He was on some case. We still have all the newspapers that were up in his room." 

Sam's mind is cursing silently that he doesn't have any badges to that would help him with this problem. He makes a mental note to forge a new badge tomorrow so he could get those papers and he thanks the receptionist when he gives her the paperwork and she hands him the key.

He makes his way towards the elevator, still aware of the manager, who apparently has a healthy set of lungs, and how the receptionist went back to typing blandly on her computer.

He has other things to do.

***  
After making his badge, it wasn't too hard to get one of the employees at the motel to give him Dean's old newspapers. People tended to listen to people with proven authority, even if it probably seemed weird that Sam wasn't a part of the local PD.

Still, the newspapers are more than helpful. Dean had been smart, Sam knows that and would swear it to the moon and back even if his brother wouldn't have, and Dean had known how to hunt. It's easy to connect Maria Velez, Derek Lloyd, and Jonathan Khan as witnesses of the last attack. Sam suspects Dean had interviewed all of them, which made it so that's what Sam is going to do as well.

He visits Maria first. She's an old, short lady with black hair that is streaked gray and she looks at Sam as if he's taking up her time. It sets Sam's teeth on edge; she isn't the one here on a mission. It takes a lot of self-restraint not to start yelling at her, which Sam doesn't think would end well.

"Mrs. Velez," he tries to say pleasantly, but he knows it doesn't come out that way, "I will only take a minute of your time."

"You better," Maria replies, opening the screen door for him and gesturing with her spoon towards the kitchen. "I have things to do."

Sam steps inside and Maria leads him towards the kitchen, sitting him down at the small table in the room. She puts down a bowl in front of him of what Sam suspects to be some kind of chicken stew.

"Pollo guisado," she says mindlessly, setting a spoon in Sam's bowl. "Come tu comida. Now, what were your questions?"

It's a testament to the fact that Sam's not eating as much as he should be because he doesn't refute what she's says. The food is good objectively, but no part of Sam can bring itself to enjoy something homemade. Instead, Sam just says as Maria continues on the stove, "Before, a young man came here, asking about the night you saw that man die."

Sam can tell from how Maria's shoulders tense up that she knows exactly what he's talking about. When she turns around, she blesses herself before she states in a grave voice, "It looked almost like a chupacabra."

"Did you actually see the animal or—?" Sam asks.

Maria sighs before narrowing her eyes at Sam. "The other man asked me the same type of questions. What's going on?"

"I'm his backup," Sam replies and he has to push away his bowl, bile rising up in his throat. "He didn't—it's a dangerous job."

"Ay dios mio," Maria says, voice cracking. "Bendito, papi. He was a nice boy. He came over here a couple of times. He kept asking me questions. I think he wanted to keep me company and he liked to eat. He was too skinny, anyway."

Sam nods, trying to keep himself from breaking, and he swallows, breathing deeply. "What'd you talk to him about?"

"He asked me about the attack as well and I didn't know a lot. I still don't, but I told him what I knew. He believed me. The attack happened somewhere down by Josie's, that's all I know. Derek knows more."

"You know Derek Lloyd?" Sam asks, raising an eyebrow.

"My daughter and him were good friends," Maria replied.

"Thank you, ma'am," Sam says nodding, dismissing himself. 

Maria tries shoving food at him, Sam suspects on Dean's behalf more than anything else. He declines anyway and Maria looks like she's trying not to take offense. Then, she sighs and bows her head, grabbing one of his hands in both of hers, and says, "Que dios te bendiga." 

A fierce rush of compassion rises up through Sam, and it's the only emotion he's felt in the past days that hasn't been guilt or misery. And even that isn't a strong as it was at Bobby's. Sam's been shoving all his sorrows down to the bottom of his soul; it's easier to work that way and Sam won't be able to _tear the skin off _the werewolf that killed his brother if he can't stop sobbing. Though, he looks at the stranger who fed his brother and seemed to provide as much comfort to him as he had to her (kindred spirits, Sam suspects) and feels a bit grateful to her.__

"Y usted," Sam answers, bowing his head as well and strokes the top of one of her hands, which are dwarfed by his. 

As Sam steps out of the house, Sam wonders if this visit was actually helpful.

He found out Dean seemed to be pretty lonely.

His brother died feeling lonely.

The visit helped.

Motivation is everything.

***  
Derek Lloyd is about Sam's age, maybe a little older. He's a friendly man, greeting Sam when he pulls up and inviting him in after a brief introduction.

"You're with the other one that was here, yes?" Derek says conversationally, seating himself across from Sam on the cramped couch in his living room. "I haven't seen him in weeks."

Sam doesn't respond to that.

"Did you go to Mrs. Velez, too? He also visited her as well. I think he believed her story about some chupacabra that attacks people."

"And you don't?" Sam inquires.

"Of course not," Derek replies, smiling sadly. "I think she was just a bit out of it."

"Really? She told me that you knew a lot more of what happened than she did."

"From where I stood, it looked more human (a girl, I think) than anything else. Mrs. Velez just said chupacabra because of the claw marks that were found on the victim and the snarling noise the girl made. The girl was probably on something. Most people in this part of the city are." Derek's eyes then darken as he looks down at his trembling hands. "There was a lot of blood," he mumbles. "The victim's chest was torn open to shreds and, even worse, his heart was missing. Can you imagine? A missing heart." Derek shudders.

"Mr. Lloyd, were you there with anyone?" Sam asks.

"I was with a couple of my boys," Derek responds.

"What about Jonathan Khan, do you know him?"

"The other guy asked me the same exact question. But no, not personally. I mean, I know him now because he was in the newspaper as well about the murder.

Sam grits his teeth; he thought he had something there with the Mrs. Velez and Derek knowing each other, but turns out it's probably just a coincidence. And it makes a small pulse of annoyance flow through him at the thought of coincidences, which usually don't pop up in this line of work. But, of course, because Sam is searching for this werewolf vehemently, coincidences are going to choose now to start up.

"Anything else you can add?" Sam says.

"Well, I forgot to tell this to the other guy, but yeah, actually. After the girl tore that guy apart, she jumped on top of another guy, but then, before she killed him, she tilted her head to the sky or something and ran out quicker than I've ever seen someone run."

It's hard for Sam to listen to what Derek's saying over the wave of anger that had pulsed through him at the mention that he had forgotten to tell Dean something. He tries to calm himself down; Dean had known that there was a pack, he didn't go into the fight without all of his information. Still, just the idea of someone withholding information makes Sam want to skewer something bloody.

Sam pops his jaw, trying to keep himself from putting a fist through Derek's head. "Do you—do you know who the other guy she attacked is?"

"Uh, yeah," Derek responds, blissfully ignorant of Sam's crawling skin. "It was actually Jonathan Khan, I think. Speak of the devil, huh?"

Sam takes a deep breath, dismissing himself from Derek as well. He doesn't want to spend anymore time on these fuckin' interviews than he has to, especially if they're just going to upset him even more than he already is.

Derek walks Sam out, trying to start up a conversation that Sam lets die as soon as Derek brings up a topic. Finally, as Sam leaves, Derek says something important. "Just watch out for Jonathan. I dunno if he was weird before this whole attack thing, but he definitely is now. We were both interviewed for the newspaper and they had us in at the same time and, man, that guy gave me the chills."

Well, it looks like Sam's got a lead after all.

***  
Unlike Maria Velez and Derek Lloyd, who both had seemed to reasonably have gotten over something that happened about two weeks ago, Jonathan Khan is still a mess. For one, he's nursing a hangover when Sam arrives at his place and, for another, that doesn't seem at all to stop him from taking another swig from his bottle of whisky.

He peers at Sam with beady eyes, not seeming in the mood to talk. Sam doesn't really give a shit, so he just glowers at Jonathan until he does.

"I'm sorry, sir," Jonathan finally says, more than a hint of sarcasm in his voice, "but I'm not exactly sure what'cha are here for. I was already questioned, and I'd like ta wallow in peace if ya kindly don't mind."

Sam ignores his whining. "You were attacked by the girl after she killed that man, right?" 

Jonathan makes a childish groaning noise. "I already told that other guy everything. Why don'tcha ask him?"

Sam clenches his fist, trying to reign in his temper. "I'm asking you."

Jonathan pauses and takes yet another swig of whisky. "S'yeah," he says, "she climbed on top of me, too. She almost looked like she was gonna _eat me _. Then, she just got up and left."__

P"And the girl, what did she look like?"

"S'well, you're not gonna believe me, but she got claws and fangs—uh—these weird eyes, like blue. But, like, blue-blue. Like, bluuueeee. Yeah."

"Did she hurt you physically?"

"Nah, but she scared the shit outta me. Ya shoulda seen it. Fuckin' terrifying."

"Did you see where she ran off to?"

"Yeah, she went right. We were just outside Josie's. There's, like, buildings over there. Well, only, like, two. Some old warehouse and a store. The entire ordeal, it was so fuckin’ crazy. I wish I could just forget the entire thing.”

Annoyance floods through Sam. This man is complaining about the fact that he had just gotten a little spooked by the werewolf. He hadn't even been physically hurt. Sam had thought he had been bitten. But, no. Jonathan is just completely whiny about the fact that he saw something abnormal.

Sam tries to keep himself from telling Jonathan to man the fuck up. It doesn't work so well and Jonathan makes an enraged noise before pushing Sam towards the door, all with babbling some crap that Sam couldn't care less about.

It's pathetic and if it weren't for the fact that Sam now has some knowledge of where the werewolves would shack up, he would probably break Jonathan’s arm for being an ungrateful piece of shit.

Some people didn't have the luxury of coming out of a werewolf confrontation unscathed.

***  
Sam manages to find his way towards the old warehouse that Jonathan was talking about. It's definitely abandoned, Sam might even be sure it should be taken down. For one, the ceiling looks like it may collapse and that definitely is not a pleasant thought for anyone involved.

It also reeks like nothing else, but Sam suspects that's mostly because of the two dead bodies that he spots. He walks over to one of them and studies her. He guesses it's one of the werewolves Dean had been hunting, because there's a bullet hole to the chest and the woman's nails are more like claws than anything else.

Which probably makes this other lady, Sam looks her over as well, her daughter and, thus, one of the other werewolves that Dean had been hunting. He suspects that the last one had gotten away; he seems to recall the receptionist talking about how Dean was found in his motel room dead, so she had to have escaped.

And she had to have gotten the jump on his brother in his motel room. Nobody would've noticed a woman entering someone else's motel room. No one else probably would've cared. And Dean would've had a severe disadvantage to have been surprised and without backup. 

A minute growl finds its way out of Sam at the thought.

Sam breathes and then looks around. There's a pair of heels scattered by the back exit of the warehouse, one of the heels cracked in half and both seemed to have been discarded wildly. What Sam doesn't understand, however, is the bouquet of (now dead) flowers by the younger werewolf's head. He also doesn't understand the folding of the arms of each werewolf. Maybe the other daughter had made her way back here after she killed Dean, but that wouldn't have made much sense.

The werewolf seems smart, if the flee instead of fight response means anything. And she wouldn't have risked herself walking into a flower shop full of blood or had made the trek back here barefoot. Especially if she knew Dean had been a hunter, she would've known that hunters always had backup. And even if she did make her way back here, wouldn't she have taken her shoes? She wouldn't have wanted there to be any evidence of any other person here besides these two. And wouldn't she have also wanted to refresh the bouquet even if she didn't care about the evidence thing?

Sam's so deep in thought that he almost doesn't notice a pair of glasses by the feet of the mother werewolf. He picks them up. They would be in perfect condition, if it wasn't for the dust covering them. They were at the mother's feet almost ceremoniously. Sam also can't help but notice that they're men's glasses.

Sam thinks that this is what Dean had been missing when he had been hunting these werewolves.

This wasn't a three person pack.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "You're my brother, Dean. And no matter what you do, I'm gonna try and save you. And I'm sure as hell not gonna apologize for it, all right?"
> 
> -Sam Winchester 3x06 "Red Sky at Morning"


	4. Frustration

On his way back to the motel, Sam realizes that he's going to have to revise his strategy on how to find out where the rest of the pack is. Retracing Dean's steps had been a grand idea, back when Sam had thought that Dean had known all the information. It was quicker as well.

Now, however, Sam is going to have to do things the long way; what with trying to find out where the pack is, what families it consists of, and their usual pattern. And Sam's patience is not what it used to be. 

And, of course, neither of the werewolves had any sort of identification card that could help him with finding out who the rest of the pack was. Not even a driver's license. It's ridiculous, and Sam is unsure how they had been able to get by without them. Most werewolves have the basics, they are part human after all. 

Sam sighs when he pulls into the parking lot of Motel 6, thumping his head on the steering wheel. It's late, and Sam is annoyed and tired and sad, which, now that he thinks about it, seems to have been is current state for the past couple of days. He thinks, for the first time that he has gone on revenge driven mission, that he is going to get some rest.

Just for a bit. Maybe three to four hours tops. His mind is hazy and he needs to be clearheaded the next day while he tries to figure out all of these damn mysteries on how and why and what. 

And so, opening the door to his room and dumping the pair of glasses he had found on one of the tables in his room, he is determined on his new plan of attack for tomorrow. 

***  
The next day, Sam opens his laptop and searches through the area for families in the area that have, at least, four family members; a mother, two daughters, and a male figure, unknown if brother or father. Predictably, he comes up with more results that he'd be able to check going door-to-door. Sam then cross references that information with whole families who have been recently reported missing by neighbors or have moved from the area. 

He gets seven results. Three of them are missing families who have turned up, either dead or alive. One of them, he notes, has a son with cancer, and Sam immediately disregards them as well. Another has a picture of the family with the names and they don't fit with the family Sam saw in the warehouse. The two others, Sam decides, are going to be hard to find out if they're werewolves. He thinks his best bet is going to be talking with the neighbors and, if need be, going through their old houses. 

***  
The first set of neighbors he visits are on the left of the Johnson's, who had moved a little less than two weeks ago. He doesn't know a family of werewolves would move all properly instead of just high tailing it out of Vegas, but he wants to be thorough in his search. 

A young woman opens the door when he knocks, smiling pleasantly at Sam. 

"Hi, I'm Max Smith, personal investigator," he flashes his badge quickly. "I would just like to ask you a couple of questions about your recently departed neighbors, the Johnson's."

The woman raises an alarmed eyebrow. "Why? Did something happen?" 

"They might be the suspect of a murder I'm looking into," Sam responds bluntly. 

The woman gestures for Sam to enter quickly and leads him towards a small dining room table. "Are you joking? They were the nicest people."

Sam gives her a questioning look. "I just need some more information just to be sure. Nothing is concrete yet, Miss—"

"—Avery," she finishes. 

Sam nods. "Is there anything you can tell me about them?"

Miss. Avery's face is pondering as she glances down at the floor before turning back towards Sam. "I mean, I already mentioned that they were a very nice and sociable family, which isn't all that common around here. I'm not sure what the parents did for work, but they didn't seem to have a problem getting by. They had three daughters and two sons, you see. Big family. They weren't that different from normal really. Except—"

"Except what?"

"Well, they were really superstitious. Every single one of them. I've never seen a family all undivided on that kind of thing. Every single one of them believed in ghosts. And, one time, when the youngest, Ashley, was over (her and my daughter were friends), she kept scoffing at the movie they were watching (I think it was Twilight). She kept mentioning something about skin walkers and werewolves. It was completely bizarre." 

It sounds promising so far.

"Was it some kind of ritualistic killing?" Miss. Avery continues. "Because then I think it'd be easier to grasp. They were odd, but really nice. And一oh God, Ashley slept over a couple of times. She could've killed us!" 

Sam wonders why she didn't. 

"I remember it was right before they left. That Monday!" 

Wait—

"Are you sure she slept over that Monday?"

"Oh, I'm positive! I remember talking about how pretty the night sky was because we could see the full moon and she could've killed us because that's what those people believe in, the full moon and virgins, and we never would've even have known that her and her ritualistic family and we could've died and, oh my God, why didn't she kill us?"

Sam sighs, wanting to bang his head on something as Miss. Avery continues to babble. For fuck's sake, every time he thinks he has some kind of lead, someone goddamn ruins it. He interrupts whatever Miss. Avery is talking about to dismiss himself, fending off her questions about the Johnson's. 

***  
The next house he visits is the one across from the Rabbitt's. This time it's opened by an older man, who doesn't seem happy to seem Sam. 

"Who are you?" He asks annoyed, glaring at Sam. 

"Max Smith," Sam responds, keeping himself from snapping back at the old man. "Private Investigator. I just have a couple of questions about the Rabbitt's, if you don't mind." 

The man doesn't invite Sam inside, nor does the sour expression melt off of his face. In fact, if anything, the man gets even more annoyed with Sam. "What about 'em?"

"They're suspects," Sam retorts shortly. "There was a murder about two weeks ago, and I was wondering if they were involved with it."

The old man snorts rather nastily, a condescending smile making its way onto his face. "You're wasting your time. They didn't do anything." 

"How are you certain? They fit the type of the murders and I don't think you have any knowledge on the murder committed." 

The old man steps outside, closing the door behind him as he rests himself against the railing for the stairs. "Because I know the Rabbitt's. Their disappearance ain't got nothin’ to do with that murder you think they'd done. That family was all hopped up on drugs all day and night always. The kids weren't even able to go to school. Lord knows that family ain't have the brains to pull off that kind of stunt without getting caught the very next day." 

Sam raises an eyebrow inquisitively. 

"They weren't the sharpest in the tool shed by far," the old man continues. "I reckon that father got themselves taken. Serves him right, I always knew he was beating on those kids."

"You saw him hitting those kids?" 

"No, but I'm old, not blind. Every time I saw those kids step outside the house, they were all black 'n' blue everywhere. You got another explanation for the shouting and bruises now, do ya?" 

Well, fan-fucking-tastic. Nice to know that this was indeed another waste of Sam's time again. And both of his families turned out to have jackshit involved with the pack running around town. Now, he doesn't even have another lead to follow. 

"Now that you've got some information about 'em, can you get off my property? They didn't do it and I'm sure of it." 

Sam almost breaks his steering wheel in frustration when he gets into the car. 

***  
After he goes home, tries to find another lead, but fails, he goes to the motel lobby, looking for an employee. Maybe they forgot to give him another of Dean's old newspapers. Sam knows he's grasping at straws here, but he's desperate. He won’t be able to look at the bodies of the victims, most likely they're either already cremated or buried and rotting away helpful evidence. The pack has probably already moved onto another town and Sam is still stuck here in downtown Vegas trying to piece everything together. 

This couldn't be a worse situation, trying to track a monster from two weeks ago. 

He's about to ask the front desk when he hears two of the employees talking. 

"—you're being ridiculous, that's not what's going on."

"No, I'm not! It's the most plausible explanation! Why else would Eli be missing?" 

"Uh—maybe he got fired?" 

"Fired? For what? Maybe for sleeping with Hank, I suppose."

"Oh my God, Joyce, Eli hasn't been missing because Hank's wife decided to go nuts after she found out that they've been sleeping together. It's been almost two weeks since he last came in, he probably was fired for always being late." 

"Maybe. I still think it's hilarious that his cousin showed up here looking for him, though. You would think she would know that he never showed up to work."

"She probably wasn't looking for Eli. Wouldn't she know that he was fired? She didn't actually say that she was looking to Eli. She was probably looking for her boyfriend or something."

"Oh yeah, cause 'Hey, I'm looking for a young guy with blond hair, green eyes, freckles, and is absolutely gorgeous even though my cousin has all of those features' totally means she wasn't after Eli. Puh lease." 

Sam interest peaks, and he thinks he has another lead. "Excuse me," he says and two girls exit from behind the backroom. He pulls out his badge and shows it to them. "You said something about one of your coworkers being missing?"

They both nod. 

"What's his name?" Sam asks. 

"Eli Hankel," they both respond instantly. 

"Do you know anything about Eli Hankel that would be particularly useful?" 

"Useful how, sir?" 

"Family members, relatives, good friends who might help him get away with something illegal." 

"He's got three brothers that live here," one of the girls responds instantly. "And a father. They live next to their cousins, the Reese's. I think a mother and a daughter." 

"Two daughters," the other girl corrects immediately. "And, even though everyone says they're cousins, they're actually not related to the Hankel's."

The first girl looks at the other one with one part astonishment and two other parts amusement while the second girl flushes dark red and looks at the ground sheepishly. 

"Do you know what they looked like?" Sam asks, remembering the auburn haired mother with other of her clawed hands resting on her chest and the daughter, flowers laid beside her black and green hair. 

"I think the mother was a brunette," the first girl says questioningly. "I'm not certain. Though I know one of the daughters had black hair."

"And the other dyed her hair multiple times," the second adds. "I don't know what color, though." 

Sam could almost kiss these two. 

"Do you know where they lived?"

"No. Sorry, sir. Only that they were neighbors."

"Eli, though, I think mentioned something about owning The Fashion Nurse down by the abandoned warehouse, though."

The other girl scoffs. "He was lying, though. No way. I saw his dad at the supermarket once, and he looked nothing like the owner of Nurse, which closed like two weeks ago."

Sam doesn't discount it, especially since it's right next to the abandoned warehouse and closed two weeks ago. No way is that a coincidence. 

Sam briefly thanks the girls before leaving. His chest is doing jumping jacks, Sam thinks it's the anticipation building in his chest. It's a lead, a damn good one. And he could very well find out where that pack went. He could finally kill them. All of them. Slash them open messy and bloody just like they did with his brother. 

***  
The Fashion Nurse is not a small store. Sure, it isn't the biggest store around, but that doesn't mean there's a lack of square feet in the one-story little shop. 

It's littered with clothes, and it's not as if Sam didn't expect that from the name. But judging from the fact that it took Sam less than five minutes to break in, the owner obviously doesn't care much about the clothes. 

The owner isn't at the shop either, but that's to be expected as well. The girls had said that the shop has been closed for two weeks, which can't be just a coincidence. It takes him just about twenty minutes to search the store, but he finds jack. 

He's about to leave when he sees the Employees Only sign on a door in the back of the store. 

Sam's more than a little shocked to see that the back of the store is more or less exactly like the scene back at the abandoned warehouse. 

Sam can make out four dead bodies, all sprawled relatively close to each other. They're all male, that much is clear. One of them has his glasses askew across the bridge of his nose as his dark bangs remained ruffled across of his forehead. 

Another is young and blond haired, with his long legs spread across the dark haired one with glasses. It's an uncomfortable position, and Sam's guessing that it's due to the fact that they both seem to have knife wounds to the chest. The blond's dark eyes are glassy and open. 

The third is slumped in a heap against the wall, hands clutched to his chest and dried blood leaking from his open mouth and pooling at his chin. There's a couple of dark drops on his pants as well. 

The final body is what Sam would assume to be the father, only if he didn’t look so young. He had to have been well-built, even if Sam's just studying his corpse. His dark, bald head is bent at an odd angle, making his light eyes stare listlessly at a spot almost behind him, but Sam knows that it's the knife wound that killed him, too. 

Sighing internally, Sam searches the area, looking for a fourth body. Maybe another pair of hunters had gotten these werewolves before Sam could. It's always possible, but the girls had said that the guy had three brothers and a father. That's five people in the family total. 

Sam is anything but an idiot. He had received a full ride to Stanford for fuck's sake, so Sam doesn't understand why he keeps counting four bodies. It's simple math, really. But no matter how many times Sam keeps counting the number of bodies in the room, all he's getting is a mind boggling four. 

Which doesn't make sense, exactly like the last scene. If one of the wolves had survived, wouldn't he have killed the hunters attacking him? And that still would've been more than four bodies. 

Looking at the dark spot on the ground with rope/intestines(?) in it (and forget a pool of blood, this is a fuckin' ocean for Christ's sake), Sam asks what the odds of two different werewolves managing to evade death at two different ambushes, but not being able to kill whoever had ambushed them. 

Sam wonders if they have some kind of luck medallion or something, cause that shit ain't normal. 

***  
Sam's first coherent thought when he gets back into the car and sets it on its trek back towards the hotel is that there were other hunters in town after Dean had killed the first two werewolves, but reflecting back on the scene, those wounds were old wounds. And, other hunters would've known to dispose of the body. That had seemed fumbled and desperate, almost as if whoever killed those monsters had just stumbled upon them. It didn’t seem preplanned at all, and Sam rethinks his ambush theory.

This entire thing is maddening. Absolutely maddening. Sam's starting to understand why it has taken John so long with his quest for Mom. Just when you think you have a lead, turns out things are more complicated than you expect. It's annoying, how intricate this entire tale has been woven and spun. But, then again, Dean wouldn't have been taking out by any old, simple hunt. 

His brother had been a natural at fourteen. Sam can only imagine how good Dean would have been at eighteen. 

A sob tears its way out of Sam's throat and he slams the wheel with his hand. He feels as if he's five again, frustrated that he keeps hoping Mom is coming back and he keeps being let down and this time, there's no little baby Dean to grab his hand and hug his leg while giving him a smile. 

Sam wants to scream at the suffocation of it all. 

He spends the rest of the ride brewing with a mixture of emotions that make him miserable individually, so the concoction of them all make the feeling a lot more worse. Finally, he pulls himself into the motel parking lot. He exits the car and pulls out his keys. 

It doesn't take long for Sam to notice the trail of liquid on the pavement towards his room. Exactly towards his towards his room and Sam isn't naive enough to think that the liquid isn't blood. 

He puts a hand on his gun and pulls it out, opening the door as quietly as he can. 

The lamp is on in his room right next to the bed and it barely confirms what Sam had previously thought; that the liquid is indeed blood. 

There's also someone on his bed, who hasn't seemed to have noticed that Sam has entered the room, their face turned down and shielded by the shadows. Sam flips the safety of his gun off. 

The person on his bed jumps up, pulling a gun out faster than Sam can register clearly and pointing it in Sam's direction.

Sam is vaguely aware of his own gun falling to the ground (luckily not going off). He knows the chill that goes through him isn't real, but the flood of emotions is too strong to not be able to control. He can't process a thing except the other man.

The other man, who seems younger than Sam and has blood braided through his blond hair and a freckled face, doesn't make another move, keeping his green eyes trained on Sam's and his lips pulled back into a vicious snarl.

"Hiyah, Sammy."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "I always figured one of them finally got ya. I tried to think of what to do, you know? The next step to take. I was just lost."  
> -Sam Winchester 11x19 "The Chitters"


End file.
